The Beatles' Biggest Secrets (five); The Real King Herod (C4); Diary Of A Teenage Nudist (C4): Listen, do you wanna know a secret? Paul McCartney used to argue with John Lennon because it cost a penny extra to have jam on your toast when they ate breakfast out.

Not an earth-shattering revelation, but there was little in The Beatles' Biggest Secrets that wasn't already public knowledge. Biggest Con, more like. The narrator promised us tales of sex, infidelity and drug-fuelled creativity (just like a normal day in The Northern Echo office) but delivered only rumours and hints.

It would've been surprising if a group who lived and worked together as a worldwide sensation didn't argue and take the occasional artificial stimulus to maintain their spirits.

In their early Hamburg days, the lads mixed with pimps, prostitutes and gangsters and - horror of horrors - had to wash in a sink in the toilet with men taking a pee next to them, although hopefully not in the sink. They used to shoplift socks and underwear.

The habits of "intrepid sexual adventurer" John Lennon were of particular concern to the programme. There was talk of a liaison in a transvestite club and the inevitable nudge, nudge, wink, wink references about his relationship with gay manager Brian Epstein.

Various people who used to work for The Beatles attempted to fill in the details. It appears there are various Beatle children blissfully unaware of their fathers' identity to this day. Getting personal on tour, it was explained, was difficult, although the Fab Four could take their pick of the "painted kind of women who were not walking the streets for exercise".

If the so-called Biggest Secrets never materialised, the programme did bring together all the gossip and backstage rumour into a 90-minute tabloid-style documentary.

The Real King Herod also promised more than it delivered. It couldn't even decide whether he ordered the massacre of the innocents to avoid the arrival of a new king of the Jews. The only evidence he was a baby killer are a few lines in Matthew's gospel. St Luke doesn't mention it and neither does Josephus, the historian who chronicled Herod's life in detail.

This doesn't make Herod a good man. Murder and madness characterised his final years as he had his first-born son executed and ordered other killings. The "insane blood lust of his final days" may have been caused by illness. Today, medical experts believe an acute kidney disease may have literally driven him mad.

Eighteen-year-old Bianca in Diary Of A Teenage Nudist grew up in a nudist club run by her parents. She's kept her clothes on for the past six years but was inquisitive about the attitude to naturism of other teenagers. Most of those at the club, as we saw, are the sort of fat and wrinkled people who provide a good advertisement for keeping your clothes on.

Bianca found Ben, 19, who likes wandering naked in the woods. I'd be worried about the stinging nettles but he likes to let it all hang out.

"It's been my private little thing," he said, referring not to his not-so-private-now-millions-have-seen-them-on-TV parts but the fact that he hadn't told his parents about his naked inclinations. I hope he did before the programme was broadcast.

Published: 30/12/2004